


Salut d'Amour

by Fluxit_Aqua_et_Sanguine



Series: Jared Moore: Violist [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Inspired by Music, Music, Written in college
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-22 14:24:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17664332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fluxit_Aqua_et_Sanguine/pseuds/Fluxit_Aqua_et_Sanguine
Summary: Jared Moore, your average music-loving Music major, loses and finds a great deal.





	Salut d'Amour

**Author's Note:**

> So... I've decided to post a few of the things that I wrote in college, because they're not doing anything sitting around on my computer, and it'd be easy for me to show people to some of my work if it's compiled here. This one's from SEVEN YEARS AGO now! Oof.
> 
> Do comment if you've taken the time to read! I'd really appreciate it!

He couldn’t believe that it’d happened. He had checked a thousand times, reminding himself over and over again in his mind, practically sweating over the mere thought of forgetting it. Then, a sighting of a friend from home later, the thing had completely fallen out of his mind.

Jared was a young viola student just starting to make something of himself in the music community. He knew the series of Bartok concertos by heart, could tune to his own relative pitch (as long as he wasn’t in an orchestra) and could name the dates of any famous viola player he knew. And he was _going_ to be the man who, confronted with the massive responsibility of bringing a prized instrument to its rightful resting place, would not manage to lose it on the train or some such nonsense. He was far too good a player, too good a musician and too good a _man_ to do something so ridiculous.

Yet he managed to do practically just that after only a few hours out of town. He had been charged to make a sacrificial offering of his headmaster’s prized violin to the spirit of Edward Elgar by taking it to his grave in Worcestershire. Rumor had it that Elgar himself had, with a particularly spirited swing of his baton, accidentally given a puncture wound to the violinist who first owned the thing at the premier performance of _Pomp and Circumstance,_ which was quite enough to make the instrument irreplaceable and incredibly valuable to the “musical community.” On the train, sitting beside the fitted black case and chatting to the people around him, Jared had seen a friend from his old private school in Dublin and couldn’t resist striking up a conversation about his musical endeavors—so, with his preoccupation in finding his phone number to exchange with the suddenly pretty young woman, he hadn’t had the mental capacity to notice the train easing its way from the station until it was galloping out of the countryside again with the instrument taking up prime space next to the scratched fiberglass window.

The conservatory would undoubtedly have his head when they found out, and the media would deal with the rest. He could see the headline of _The Mirror_ in the graphitised wall of the old train station when he looked up: _Muddling Musician Misplaces Majestic Maple-Wood Violin,_ it would proclaim in black letters thick in font and in its ridiculous attempt to be clever, just like every headline those days. It seemed to him that the English were always trying to be clever.

He lit a cigarette and stared around the nearly empty station again, feeling ridiculous and out of place in the tuxedo he had been charged to wear to show “respect for the dead.” With a bit of wry laughter forced from his throat, in something of a better humour since the shock had begun to ease its strangle-hold on his larynx, Jared finally stood and moved stiffly to the ticket-window.

“Excuse me,” he called inside, with an impatient rap on the glass between him and the oily teenaged girl manning the counter. “Where does the train go after this stop? I’ve left something quite important on it.” She shrugged and pushed her flat brown hair from her eyes in response, at first—then she saw Jared’s peculiar dress and let out a squeaking laugh that rang through the cement-walled underground.

“Blimey, you’re a one, aren’t you?” She giggled through her chewing gum and her strong Northern accent, and leaned close to the glass. “It’s gone all the way back to London. You’ll have to wait here a good few hours, unless you want to go chasing after it.” The girl laughed snidely again and flipped open a magazine sitting on the pile by her feet. As much as he hated to admit it, the girl was right. He would just have to go about trying to get Doctor Hale on the phone and explain everything to him before it was too late to begin that dreaded task.

Jared walked swiftly from the platform up to the street to make the call back to Cambridge, where his headmaster was already awaiting confirmation of his arrival. The dialling itself was painful. Jared felt like every depression of a button on his mobile phone was like a step made to the gallows, and, like walking to one’s execution, he guessed, was over and starting the main event without a moment’s pause. Doctor Hale’s voice over the phone was sickeningly cheerful when he picked up.

“Jared! I was wondering when you’d come in. Those London trains are always sloth-slow on the weekends. How was the journey? Did you find a taxi to Little Malvern yet?”

 Jared froze under the strain of the mild interrogation, knowing he would have to break that cheerful demeanor—and, likely, his future in music—with his responses.

“The journey was pleasant enough, Doctor Hale, and, no, I haven’t. You see, I—I left the violin on the train.” He spoke this last in such a rush that the lively old professor on the other line laughed incredulously at him.

“Speak a bit slower, will you, lad?” The young man breathed, and started again deliberately,

“I left the violin on the train. It’s _en route_ back to London as we speak. I could try to catch it there, if I can find a taxi that’ll speed decently for me, but I don’t think there’s enough time to—”

“Jared.” Doctor Hale’s voice had gone eerily deep. “There’s no point trying any of that nonsense. You will wait at the station, and pray to God that instrument finds its way back to you, or you’re going to have to find yourself a new city to start your career. London won’t forgive you for this.” With that, the line was quiet once more, and Jared slumped helplessly against the lamppost he had been clinging to, raking his hands through his hair as his scalp had begun to itch. Nerves and the tub of gel he’d used on it before leaving for the station, he supposed.

Stuffing his hands in his pockets, Jared decided that a walk around the small city of Upton-upon-Severn wouldn’t go amiss. The High Street was charming enough, with its old-fashioned white facades and church steeples poking into the sky every so often. He had been there before for music competitions, but everything seemed different since he had been thrown into a crisis only to have to “wait and see.” Before, he’d thought it terribly boring, compared with the metropolises of Dublin and London in which he’d spent nearly all of his life… then, facing a problem what would likely end with his death (or, so something nagging the back of his mind said, anyway) it was a muted and serene sort of town, staid, but easing to the mind.

It was a shame, therefore, that time had the unfortunate habit of running rampant when one had responsibilities gone undone. When he checked his watch on setting out through the city, it was ten-thirty; by the time he did so again, it was three hours later, and he had to run his way through the streets to get back to the station,  just hearing the occasional little twittering of mirth by the people he passed in the street. He hadn’t had to worry such as he did, as the train hadn’t yet arrived when he tripped back down the stairs to the platform and threw himself into a bench by the stiles to wait. The anticipation made his heart continue on at the pace it had taken up since he’d begun running up until the train rolled in— _then_ it felt like it had stopped.

The doors opened, and no-one exited the train. It wasn’t exactly a popular stop, this, but, still. His mind frantically assessed the situation, wondering whether fewer people was a good or a bad omen for the presence of his violin, when, instead of steps emerging from the train, he heard music singing gently from the inside. _Violin_ music.

After indiscreetly jumping the stile he rushed into the first compartment and through to the very last, where he found a bent, poorly-dressed old man playing _his_ violin. The old instrument was spinning a gorgeous rendition of Elgar’s _Salut d’Amour_ , the vibrato warbling wildly with the shake of Parkinson’s that held the man’s hands and managed to romanticize the piece even further. Only at the end of the melodic phrase did the man stop, and looked up at Jared through tired, watering eyes. The young man was stunned into unfeeling. What could one do?  Take the violin away from him, because it was known for some ridiculous passing in the presence of a famous composer? No orchestra in London would have Jared play for them  if he didn’t take it back, but… here was a man who looked little better than the average homeless man on the street, simply playing his instrument, having no idea of its worth, and—

“Play you a song, lad?” the old gentleman questioned with a croak to his voice, and set the bow peaceably back on the brightly-polished A string. With that, Jared had made his choice.

“Yes, please… do you know any Shostakovich?”

 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Doctor Hale was right, as he always was. The scandal of the lost violin made London so bitterly angry that, despite the lack of professional viola-players in the city, no orchestra would even think of taking Jared in once they heard his name. The kind of irresponsibility he had shown was not easily-forgiven, especially for those imbued with the precision that came with being string-players. Jared could still recite the headline that condemned him: _Irresponsible Irish Instrumentalist Irrefutably Disgraces Elgar_.

He couldn’t say he was upset by it, though. England changed people, and made them shallow-minded. His countrymen had always said, after all, that England lived for appearances where Ireland lived for the soul. Jared liked to think that he had proven the theory.


End file.
